1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a dubbing function of an information recording device incorporating, for example, an HDD (Hard Disc Drive), a DVD (Digital Versatile Disc), a VCR (Videocassette Recorder) and the like.
2. Description of the Background Art
In recent years, there have been developed various types of recording media and recording devices for recording information and sound onto such recording media, and these recording media and devices have been used in manners suitable for their applications. However, these recording media have respective recording techniques, which make it difficult to provide compatibility thereamong. This requires utilization of recording devices suitable for respective recording media, thus causing the problem of necessity of complex operations.
Therefore, an information recording device having a dubbing function has become a mainstream, wherein the dubbing function is the function of recording information recorded on VCRs and the like, which have been conventionally commonly domestically utilized, onto other recording media such as a hard disc and a DVD medium to catalog information. For example, there is a DVD recording device incorporating an HDD.
Conventionally, there have been suggested various types of dubbing functions, namely techniques for transferring information from recording media which store information recorded thereon to other recording media. Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 05-089644 discloses a technique for efficiently conducting editing operations using a hard disc or the like, for dubbing information recorded on a video tape being reproduced onto another video tape. Further, Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 2004-104287, Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 2004-260452 and Japanese Utility Model Registration No. 3070837 disclose techniques for temporally recording information into a hard disc and then recording it from the hard disc onto another recording medium, for dubbing. Further, Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 05-036244 discloses a technique for recording information onto a magneto-optical recording medium such as a DVD medium and then transferring and recording it from the magneto-optical recording medium into a hard disc for dubbing, which enables easily and efficiently performing editing operations and the like using information recorded in the hard disc or the like, since information is temporally recorded in the hard disc or the like and then is transferred and recorded into another recording medium.
On the other hand, in the case of dubbing for simply transferring and recording information from a recording medium onto another recording medium without performing editing operations, it is more efficient to directly perform dubbing without temporally recording the information into a hard disc or the like, which can reduce the dubbing time.
FIG. 3 is a view illustrating the flow of information during dubbing in a conventional information recording device 10.
Referring to FIG. 3, a single information recording device 10 incorporates an HDD recorder (hereinafter, simply referred to as an HDD) 11, a DVD recorder (hereinafter, simply referred to as a DVD) 12 and a videocassette recorder (hereinafter, referred to as a VCR) 13. HDD 11, DVD 12 and VCR 13 are configured to enable dubbing bidirectionally and, therefore, information recording device 10 is also referred to as a triple recorder.
There are illustrated in FIG. 3 information transmission lines L1, L2 and L3, wherein information transmission line L1 is an information transmission line from DVD 12 to the other two recorders HDD 11 and VCR 13. Accordingly, an output node for outputting information from DVD 12 is connected to input nodes of HDD 11 and VCR 13. Information transmission line L2 is an information transmission line from VCR 13 to the other two recorders HDD 11 and DVD 12. Accordingly, an output node for outputting information from VCR 13 is connected to input nodes of HDD 11 and DVD 12. Information transmission line L3 is an information transmission line from HDD 11 to the other two recorders DVD 12 and VCR 13. Accordingly, an output node for outputting information from HDD 11 is connected to input nodes of DVD 12 and VCR 13.
Switches SW1 to SW3 are provided in correspondence with HDD 11, DVD 12 and VCR 13, and control signals CT1 to CT3 are input to the respective corresponding switches for switching among the information transmitting paths.
More specifically, in HDD 11, switch SW1 electrically connects one of information transmission lines L1 and L2 to the input node of HDD 11, in accordance with control signals CT1. In DVD 12, switch SW2 electrically connects one of information transmission lines L2 and L3 to the input node of DVD 12, in accordance with control signals CT2. Similarly, in VCR 13, switch SW3 electrically connects one of information transmission lines L1 and L3 to the input node of VCR 13, in accordance with control signals CT3.
With this configuration, by selectively providing control signals CT1 to CT3 during dubbing, it is possible to easily perform dubbing bidirectionally in HDD 11, DVD 12 and VCR 13.
However, information recording device 10 is configured such that switches SW1 to SW3 are provided in correspondence with the respective recording units: HDD 11, DVD 12 and VCR 13. Also, it is necessary that control signals CT1 to CT3 to be provided to switches SW1 to SW3 are selectively transmitted from the control circuits (not shown) of the respective recording units, and the respective recording units can be individually operated, which causes the problem of complexity of controls.